Because maybe people don’t just get a Mac for gaming but would like to have that option with games that are supported. I have a Mac because I’m a creative professional - not because I’m a gamer, but I also play a few games on my Mac as well.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
If my consideration between 24-core GPU and 32-core is about gaming, is there no point spending the extra for the 32?
- Thread starter WinterEmerald
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
It purely depends on your definition of gaming.
Many games run fine on M1 Macs, including lots of the Assassins Creed games:
So with twice as many high performance CPU cores and 3 or 4 times the number of GPU cores I’m sure it will be decent.
Many games run fine on M1 Macs, including lots of the Assassins Creed games:
So with twice as many high performance CPU cores and 3 or 4 times the number of GPU cores I’m sure it will be decent.
No matter what Parallels says, they still have to make a software version of the intel chip, underneath their virtual Intel programming. Fast games need the basic architecture machine code.
At every WWDC Apple has sessions for game developers and game optimizations. This year they showed how they worked directly with Larian Studios and 4 A to help them optimize Badur's Gate 3, Divinity: Original Sin 2 and Metro Exodus. Apple do quite a lot to make it easier for developers but it's up to the developers to decide if it's worth it.
Here are a few examples:
Optimize high-end games for Apple GPUs - WWDC21 - Videos - Apple Developer
Optimize your high-end games for Apple GPUs: We'll show you how you can use our rendering and debugging tools to eliminate performance...
Bring your Metal app to Apple silicon Macs - WWDC20 - Videos - Apple Developer
Meet the Tile Based Deferred Rendering (TBDR) GPU architecture for Apple silicon Macs — the heart of your Metal app or game's graphics...
Platforms State of the Union - WWDC21 - Videos - Apple Developer
Take a deeper dive into the new tools, technologies, and advances across Apple platforms that will help you create even better apps.
I have 1 game on my MacBook Pro M1 , Troy total war with EVERYTHING set to MAXX/ULTRA and the M1's maximum resolution and it plays flawlessly from afar or camera right in the battle. That is the only game I own ( well I did have about 50 till the 32bit cull ) and I'm struggling to find anything else. I did have DIRT4 on but 5mins into the game on the dot the game froze the M1 dead where even the keyboard wouldn't work.
I went from a ****ty Intel MacBook Air 2017 wanting to play games , buys an M1 pro that can play games and can't play games as there isn't any !!!
I went from a ****ty Intel MacBook Air 2017 wanting to play games , buys an M1 pro that can play games and can't play games as there isn't any !!!
It's a virtual machine bud. Using a percentage of your system's resources. A very poor choice for gaming. And it is not even officially supported on Apple Silicon. The odds of bugs and random failures is high.
Exactly this. Not sure why some people seem so 100% against any gaming on a Mac. I have used Macbook Pros for many years for work.
I also enjoy building proper desktop gaming pc's for playing games.
But that doesn't mean I don't sometimes want to do a bit of gaming on my Macbook Pro when I am travelling for business and want some downtime, or on a plane, or even when at home for whatever reason.
If someone is getting a Mac purely for gaming sure that is a bit ridiculous.
I am getting the new MacBook Pro for work and personally I don't need the 32 cores for work. However I am interested to see the first reviews/benchmarks showing the difference as if 32 cores is going to give an advantage for gaming over the 24 cores why wouldn't I spend that small amount extra.
I've heard this argument from multiple people and it always sounds stupid, to be brutally honest. Where exactly did I say I was buying a Mac purely for gaming? People buy Macs for other reasons, but there's nothing wrong at all with taking advantage of the tools for gaming that are offered for doing it on your Mac as well.
I honestly get this same dumb argument against the fact I have an Xbox, asking why not just buy a gaming PC. It's simple, because I like the Xbox and what it offers all-round, and simply put, I like being able to play games on my main computer as well when it's possible.
I know where you are coming from OP. I use a Mac, and I like to play games. I don’t see the point of having a desktop PC for games, and I truly love the aesthetics, beauty, and overall design of Macs. I personally do not believe that it is insane to purchase a Mac to play games, whether you use it for other tasks or you bought it solely for that. It is your money, it is your life, don’t let peoples definition of what makes sense in a particular situation to them necessarily apply to you. Is it going to be even more difficult now with Apple Silicon? Yes. Is it impossible? No, not at all. In fact, ever since the Developer Transition Kit I have been testing the gaming performance of the A12Z to see how well it could even run games in the Mac App Store (i.e. Tomb Raider) when it wasn’t even supported. It ran surprisingly well.
Then M1 came out and Bootcamp was officially dead for Apple Silicon users. I tinkered around with solutions on github to load up ARM Windows prior to Parallel officially releasing their Technical Preview. I went through my Steam library of about 25 games to see what worked and what didn’t. I reported my findings to a Reddit user who collated mine and others sources of games that worked on Apple Silicon.
Apple Silicon has now matured even more. In Parallels official release supporting Apple Silicon, it was jaw-dropping to see how well games worked in a virtualized environment with an 8GB Unified Memory machine on the M1. Now with M1 Max coming out next week, I am going to continue playing games on a Mac, now with 64GB Unified Memory and a 32-core GPU. Do I work on my Mac? Yes. I also ordered a Steam Deck for playing games that will not run on the Mac on the go, but if it can load up on the MacBook Pro - I will play it their first.
Then M1 came out and Bootcamp was officially dead for Apple Silicon users. I tinkered around with solutions on github to load up ARM Windows prior to Parallel officially releasing their Technical Preview. I went through my Steam library of about 25 games to see what worked and what didn’t. I reported my findings to a Reddit user who collated mine and others sources of games that worked on Apple Silicon.
Apple Silicon has now matured even more. In Parallels official release supporting Apple Silicon, it was jaw-dropping to see how well games worked in a virtualized environment with an 8GB Unified Memory machine on the M1. Now with M1 Max coming out next week, I am going to continue playing games on a Mac, now with 64GB Unified Memory and a 32-core GPU. Do I work on my Mac? Yes. I also ordered a Steam Deck for playing games that will not run on the Mac on the go, but if it can load up on the MacBook Pro - I will play it their first.
I have multiple Macs and a gaming PC. You're the one doing it wrong, pal. Sorry.
Uh, that's Parallels support. Not Windows. I can see there is no point in discussing with you though. You are told the right way to do something, and then say its stupid, and you should be able to make the worst possible way into a viable option.
I'm done.
Parallels running on Apple silicon is supported but Windows on ARM on non-official devices isn't. Windows on ARM can run on Raspberry Pis but it's a hack job and not officially supported.
They won't, Apple does not want to cheapen the brand by having it seen as a 'gaming' machine. That aside, suppose they decided tomorrow they do want it. Apple Silicon is not a magic wand to gaming.
The vast majority of the 100m+ mac users are still on intel and more than that they are not gamers in the main. It will be closer to a decade before enough are using Apple Silicon to interest gaming houses and even then will there be enough gamers? I highly doubt it.
Microsoft already has x86-64 to Aarch64 translation with Windows 11 for Arm. Why would Parallels need to do it too? Parallels supplies the Aarch64 virtual machine that can boot Windows 11 (unsupported by Microsoft) and then anything that can run in Arm Windows 11 can run on the Parallels VM.
Yes, I'm doing it wrong because I have less money than you. That's obviously it.
But, you are. You can't expect to have the experience as someone who is doing it right. And yeah in this case doing it right means spending money on the right equipment for the job.
Gaming through Parallels is never going to be a solution. I think I did it once to emulate some 90's game. It's fine for that. You're not going to play AAA games that way.
My god, you are so ridiculously out of touch if, just because you're in a fortunate position to own multiple Macs and a gaming PC, you feel you're doing it "right" and everyone else who doesn't obviously have the same financial position as you is doing it wrong.
I'm trying to make the most out of the Mac I am getting with the software that is available, be it with some of the native games or the most I can with Parallels. I know I'm obviously dirt compared to you with my Mac and Xbox but what can you do eh? I'm clearly wrong.
Dude, my problem isn't whether or not you believe gaming on Mac isn't possible, because I've had great experiences and will continue to do so.
My problem is your, frankly, pretty disgusting statement that people are doing it "wrong" because they don't own multiple Macs and a gaming PC like you wonderfully do. There's nothing objective about this, one does what one can with what one has.
Last edited by a moderator:
You don't need 32 cores for simple games like Civilisation.
If you are serious about those AAA games available on PC, then like others have said, get a gaming PC. It is not just about having powerful CPU and GPU, sometimes you also need lots of gaming accessory available for the platform and software support from game developers.
Mac and gaming are still mutually exclusive, for now.
If you are serious about those AAA games available on PC, then like others have said, get a gaming PC. It is not just about having powerful CPU and GPU, sometimes you also need lots of gaming accessory available for the platform and software support from game developers.
Mac and gaming are still mutually exclusive, for now.
I'll be curious to see the reviews and comparisons that start hitting the web next week. It could very well be that for most people, for most applications, the 24 core GPU is enough, and there may be benefits in terms of battery life or thermal throttling. I'll probably toss the extra $200 in and get the 32 anyway. But maybe not...
Don't worry, OP.
Game developers will develop for ARM soon. Google has it's ARM tensor chip, which they will definitely try to bring to their chrome books.
Microsoft has been developing a custom ARM chip since December 2020. They're also working on Windows ARM.
Alibaba just released a 5nm custom ARM server chip 2 days ago.
The industry is gravitating to ARM chips. If game companies are not aware of this fact, then they are incredibly dumb. iOS games make the bulk of Apple's service revenue.
Game developers will develop for ARM soon. Google has it's ARM tensor chip, which they will definitely try to bring to their chrome books.
Microsoft has been developing a custom ARM chip since December 2020. They're also working on Windows ARM.
Alibaba just released a 5nm custom ARM server chip 2 days ago.
The industry is gravitating to ARM chips. If game companies are not aware of this fact, then they are incredibly dumb. iOS games make the bulk of Apple's service revenue.